(ANSA) – Rome, October 14 – Italy’s employers on Tuesday hailed Premier Matteo Renzi’s forthcoming 2015 budget bill as a dream come true while Italy’s largest CGIL labor federation slammed it as a recessive move that does not do enough for workers.
The 30-billion-euro budget featuring 18 billion euros in tax cuts aims to kick-start the Italian economy, which is now its third recession in six years. It goes to the cabinet for ratification on Wednesday.
The government has said it will raise some 16 billion euros by slashing bloated public administration spending, including items such as chauffered cars for ministry staffers, and by going after tax evaders.
“I think that the mix of spending cuts and tax reductions for some will keep the country in the recessionary state it’s in at the moment,” said CGIL chief Susanna Camusso.
“The budget does not stimulate investments or create jobs”.
Camusso on Monday threatened to call a general strike against the government, which she said “takes its platform from Confindustria,” which represents Italy’s largest industrial employers. She added that Renzi “has no idea where to take the country”. Italy, said Camusso, is the only European Union country without a patrimony tax on its wealthiest citizens, and it also has the lowest inheritance tax. The government’s budget bill to be unveiled Wednesday “is merely the repetition of those that preceded it”, she said.
Labour Minister Giuliano Poletti replied that on the contrary, the budget bill is an “expansive” one, given that it “mobilizes resources to restart the Italian economy”.
The president of the Confindustria industrialists’ association waxed enthusiastic over Renzi’s measures.
“We cannot but declare our utmost satisfaction,” Giorgio Squinzi said. “(The measures) go exactly in the direction we have been calling for over many years”.
Squinzi added that “when I heard the premier announcing the budget measures I honestly felt almost as though a dream of ours had come true”. Renzi’s measures include omitting labour taxes from the IRAP regional business tax and a three-year tax exemption for employers hiring permanent staff.
“This budget has a radically new approach,” Cabinet Undersecretary Graziano Delrio has said. “We want to put money in the pockets of Italians on a regular basis, and now everyone, including entrepreneurs, will know they can count on structural measures”.